Overnight stays in 2018

Stuttgart continues to expand

Stuttgart's tourism industry continues to expand steadily and produced positive results for 2018. With 3.91 million overnight stays in all and an increase of 3.4 per cent compared with the year before, in 2018 the state capital's tourism sector chalked up its best results to date.

With the exception of May every month showed record results. The month with the highest volume was October, with 375.746 overnight stays. The greatest increase in the course of the year 2018 was in June, with a total of 344.015 overnight stays and a rise of 13.9 per cent. The second-largest gain (10.7 per cent) compared with the previous year was in February – a good result that is partly due to trade fairs such as the Intergastra or the R+T.

The ratio of room nights booked by German and foreign guests in 2018 was 69:31 and thus similar to recent years. Germany (mainly Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, North Rhine-Westphalia and Hesse) remains Stuttgart's most important source market and registered 2,689,286 overnight stays and an increase of 2.3 per cent. Growth rates among foreign guests were even more pronounced in 2018 than in the case of domestic visitors. Here the volume of overnight stays rose by 6.1 per cent (1,222,495 overnight stays). The USA still represents Stuttgart's biggest foreign market, with 163,117 overnight stays. Switzerland clearly occupied second place as a successful tourism source market with a total of 144,833 overnight stays. After several years of continuous growth it also once again showed an increase of 3.9 per cent in 2018. Great Britain maintained its third place with 71,352 overnight stays. The Chinese market once again ranked in fourth place (68,554 overnight stays), followed by Italy in fifth place (64,247 overnight stays), with a high growth rate of no less than 14.8 per cent, closely followed by Austria (63,450 overnight stays/sixth place) and France (59,180 overnight stays/seventh place) – both markets also with strong growth rates of 12.3 and 15.8 per cent respectively. India registered a vigorous rise in 2018 of 16.4 per cent (45,473 overnight stays), while Arab countries, too, showed an increase of 3.4 per cent in 2018 compared with the previous year (25,199 overnight stays).

In recent years favourable framework conditions have contributed to the positive but measured development of Stuttgart's tourism sector (volume of overnight stays/bed capacities). As Armin Dellnitz, Managing Director of the Stuttgart-Marketing GmbH, emphasises: "Creating high-grade offers and strategically expanding the infrastructure are decisive factors for the successful future development of our region – a region with a high quality of stay and a feel-good atmosphere. For this reason decisions about Stuttgart should also be made from a tourism perspective. The prerequisite here is that awareness for this cross-sectoral industry should be firmly anchored in every domain. When arming the city for the years to come, the focus should increasingly be on tourism. This represents both a major challenge and at the same time an obligation for all concerned."